Freehouse.com.au becomes www.Share-House.com.au

The real estate website market in Australia was just too big to compete in. So I figured (with the help or others) I would focus my energy on somewhere I know would be more accommodating.

It's amazing what focusing on a niche market can do. FreeHouse was online for 3 months and barely got 30+ ads online. After targeting a niche (share housing) i've seen 10x traffic and have 100+ houses within the first month!
Presenting... www.Share-House.com.au

I learned a lot from FreeHouse and I hope that the people who downloaded the source code got a chance to really appreciate how HTML::Mason and Class::DBI does things nicely. ( Regardless of some of my sloppy code;)
I really haven't been fussed with all these new frameworks (e.g. Ruby on Rails, Catalyst) and wanted to push the boundaries of my Perl + Class::DBI + HTML::Mason skills. Share-House was completed in under 3 days. Not bad for non-<insert-hyped-techonology-here> coding... But that's for a future post:)

--

If you're still looking for the source code to FreeHouse.com.au, you can find it here. I will still help out people on getting FreeHouse running on their servers. I'm just an email away.

Friday February 02, 2007

09:25 AM

The Business of Software - Help for the microISV

Taking the bait, I jumped on the link and landed at Joel on Software. However it
wasn't the entertaining posts that I was accustomed to by Joel on
Software. It wasn't even Joel at all. It was a discussion forum
with people talking about the art of microISVs.

microISVs are vendors where the project management, marketing,
sales, coding, support and coffee is done by a single person. When
reading this, I subconsciously paraphrased Homer Simpson. "they were
guys like me. Guys like me? I'm a guy like me".

After lurking for a couple of hours and going through the archives
I decided the test the waters.
First post. Having been bitten on Usenet, Slashdot and Digg, I really didn't get my hopes
up for a response.

What a surprise. Instead of hazing, condesendence or annoying flash
ads, I got positive feedback, suggestions, links to gurus and even
a request to be interviewed!

I would suggest that if your in the same boat and paddling up the
proverbial stream, head over to BoS and feel
the love.

Why Computer Science doesn't help you at Web 2.0

I've always known I was going to be a programmer. Ever since I was
in primary school and made the
turtle move in Apple LOGO, I knew that computers were my future.

As I grew up, I spent most of my time trying to learn how to write
programs. I tried a lot of languages; BASIC, Pascal, asm, C/C++,
VB, through to the esoteric such as
PPE and Java.

When I got to University I naturally took up Computer Science. I
wasn't the type to hang out at the bars or go to toga parties. I
had something cooler to do. Something even more exciting. I read Tanenbaum.

Once the whole web-take-two thing took off, I knew that this was my
chance. I wanted a slice of the action. And with my background I
thought that I had what it takes to strike it big.

I started reading blogs by Guys who made it big. I started
listening to podcasts during
my work commute and even started jogging to catch up on any
insider
tips.

I had all bases covered; the low-level languages, the high-level
languages and even the buzzwords.

This book started me on a wild journey down the adverturous path of
the GNU. It talked about the advantages of using "higher level
languages" and that C/C++ wasn't always the answer. This prompted
me towards learning Perl. As they say... the rest is history.

The Perl programming language has taught me a lot. Not just about
the way I code, but about community. Perl has this great thing
called the CPAN (Comprehensive
Perl Archive Network) that is totally community driven which
no other language can even compete with, not even Python and PHP
combined.

So when I read the email above I was at first apprehensive. But
then it came to me. Instead of just helping Andrew, why not help
the community out there who might be learning how to use Perl to
build their website or just dipping their feet at Web 2.0.

Thinking about starting your own Web 2.0 website?

After 3 months of coming home from work, eating dinner in front of the computer and going to bed in the wee hours of the night, I was finally finished... my attempt at web 2.0 stardom was ready.

Freehouse.com.au is a website where anyone can advertise Australian property online, and in the same vain as other Web 2.0 sites, all for free.

Leading up to the launch I was filled with all kinds of emotion. From excitement, eagerness and happiness through to lots and lots of frustration.

Towards near completion, I found my heart beating faster whenever I even thought of Freehouse finally being online. I was very excited, and couldn't wait to be online. Then finally that day came...and I felt empty.

They say that the journey is more important than the destination. I didn't want to believe them.

As the next couple of days past, I watched my usage graphs like a hawk. Happy when it spiked, but sad when it was void. But when they flat-lined all together depression slowly sunk in.

People told me I was crazy wanting to start my own website. I think they'll think i'm even more crazy when I tell them I'm looking forward to my next adventure.

So if you're thinking about starting your own Web 2.0 website, don't hesitate! Just keep trying until you succeed. It's a tough ride, but then again so is the 9 to 5.